The Metaverse In Persona 5 · 12:11am Oct 10th, 2022
This post will contain spoilers about Persona 5, Royal, and Strikers. You are warned.
So, for the ones who don't know, the Metaverse is the place formed from the collective unconscious where the characters can use Personas to fight. Mementos was the first Metaverse created by Yaldabaoth, formed by the desires of the masses (which Yaldabaoth is the incarnation of). Then, in Royal, right after Yaldabaoth's defeat (with the right condition met), Takuto Maruki takes over Mementos and uses it to create a new reality made of everyone's ideal realities blending together to make a perfect world with no suffering. Then, in Strikers, a new Metaverse is created by an AI, EMMA (created by a genius named Kuon Ichinose), to stop crimes worldwide by granting the people's desires and turn them pretty much into new messiahs (known as Monarches) followed by other people turned into devoted sheep (these ones tricked by the Monarches to enter the Metaverse where their desires are stolen by the Shadows to change their hearts).
And in all the cases, once the origin of the Metaverse is defeated (not necessarily destroyed. They didn't need to kill Maruki), the Metaverse collapses and disappears.
So, my question is: if the Metaverse is gone, then how do I make Joker and the others be able to fight? It's already difficult to find something to make them be able to use Personas outside of the Metaverse if it's even possible (could find a way to somehow draw the Personas out of the Metaverse for example), so finding a way to make them use Personas when there is not even a Metaverse...
And no, I don't intend to make the story happen during the events of Persona 5 (Royal) or Personal 5 Strikers. Things will already be difficult enough without adding Persona's very complex plots made of inner desires and political complot and all that stuff.
So, uh... How do you create a new Metaverse?
I mean...considering that Joker is able to have Arcana in Smash Ultimate... Then again, the world of smash bros. is unique in and of it's own right considering there are several things that shouldn't make sense normally within the games such as Ness and Lucas having PK Starstorm during brawl and Smash 4 when they wouldn't normally plus Steve being able to get minecraft materials from every stage Smash Ultimate.
While we can chalk these things up to video game logic, that doesn't really work in the actual universe. Though you also just have Master Hand in control of most of the Smash Bros. Games; only times that doesn't happen are with Brawl and with Ultimate.
It sounds vaguely similar to creating a plane of existence. Which would be daunting, if you didn't have characters on hand with experience in doing that.
5691281
Well, there is someone in-game that managed to create a Metaverse with an AI, but I still don't know enough about the lore to know how that works. I mean, the first Metaverse, Mementos, was easy to explain: it was created by a God. But how did EMMA (and the one who made her) create the second Metaverse? If a scientist managed to do it, then Twilight, Starwirl, Slippy, Jeff, and all the other genius should be able to do it too without needing to ask Master Hand for help (especially because Master Hand won't be able to help because, by then, we should be in Ultimate territory, and we all know what happens to Master Hand in Ultimate).
Probably the same way Steven made a demon-capturing program in SMT:
For real, I kind of doubt they bothered to work it out in detail. Also I was originally thinking of Void when I said that, because he never stopped being a thing.
Do what Atlus did with P3, P3FES, P4 and P4G... blend the P5 reality with the others. The TV World from P4G was never really destroyed from what I can tell unless you don't want to count P4A and P4AU as canon. The P3 crew could still use their personas in the TV World and in the P3 world the Shadow nests were not limited to Tartarus and the Dark Hour. When you think about it, it seems like the Shadow nests, the TV World and the Metaverse might be cut from the same cloth since they are all themed around the psyche.
5691303
Well, Void is kind of a special case. While he has a lot of power, he can't create stuff, especially something as complex as a different plane of existence, with just a snap of his fingers. Even at the pic of his power when he is just "Void", it took him a huge number of years to create the Other Dimension in the first place. And the Dream Universe was created by both him and the Ancients. Now, Void, filled with positivity as he currently is, is "only" just as powerful as his Void Termina-self (because the more the Void is filled, the less there is Void). He probably could create a Metaverse, but it would take him some time and he would first need to study the Metaverse to be able to reproduce it as it should be.
5691306
I see. I haven't really bothered yet to see much of the previous Personas, so I didn't know all this. I will have to look at this and see if this can be exploited, and how. Thanks.
Alright so hear me out;essentially The only two instances Joker will ever need to use is powers are in posible Smash Tournaments in the Story and during the Events of World of Light,Right?so there is this:
For the Tournaments Master Hand could Manipulate things so that In the Scenarios there can be Some type of Barrier that makes them work close enough to the meta-verse so He Can summon his personas, and for the World of light it can be argued that because it’s a special Realm Made by Gaalem and Darkrom for their Little Warfare Game with Spirits and whatnot around, it also work Similar enough to the Meta-verse for Personas to manifest.
This would make Joker/Ren mostly a regular Teenager outside those cases but it’s a solution.
Alternatively you could have magolor and Halcantria Make something for Joker,but then there has to be a way for them to Research the Meta-verse in the First Place to make such thing.
Finally there’s maybe others solutions on Other Persona Games of the Main Franchise,but that’s up to Research.
Also since we are taking Some liberties, could you make the Other 2 Persona Protagonists Join the Roster? Yuu should be Easy enough, just having to find his Current location during P5 events,and as For Minato…Maybe both Sweetie Belle and Void could work their Powers into Making a Replacement Seal For Nyx up in the Moon to Allow Minato to get Back in the World of the Living.
Heck,May as well Include their Whole Crews since they all Can Canonically Stand up against Gods.
5691310
Should be possible to involve most of the P3 and P4 crew if you so wished. Only issue would be if you wanted to bother bringing in the P3 main protag who sacrificed himself to prevent the goddess of death Nyx from ending humanity because humanity's grief and negativity made manifest in the form of a demon beast called Erebus wants Nyx to end the world. Erebus keeps coming back for more every time its defeated btw and the Velvet Room attendant Elizabeth keeps giving it a beatdown. Velvet Room attendants are powerful...
maybe this help:
so basically: the metaverse is just one of many components of the collective unconcious ( that as a whole is more or less a paralell dimension) created for all concious minds [ of humans, animals , Artificial inteligece, Aliens ,ect..] and have a symbiotic relationship with the "real world" that spawn it.
So basically the Key Blade is a variant of how to use the power of Persona (and is not limited for the "can only use in the mind/heart realm" ) so in order for be able to use Persona powers in real life (aka outside of collective unconcious) is nessesary to research around mental/psychic/spititual manifestation in to the real world (surely the Pokemon world must have years worth of research around those topics after all they deal with those in a daily basis) , or directly study either a Heartless or a Keyblade in how they can manifest the powers of the heart in the real world.... that inside your fic is not so far away because you already imply that is possible to dreams become reality in Dream Land but there is not a defined metod to do it yet ( dreams after all are manifestaion of the heart desires/fears,ect)
5691314
There is Kuon Ichinose that should be able to help about researching the Metaverse, or Sweetie Void should be able to enter it even if it's not currently interacting with the real world or should even be able to control it like Yaldabaoth, Maruki, and EMMA. So, I don't think that researching it will be a problem.
5691315
5691319
I will have to see what I can do for the P3 and P4 crews. Is it possible to directly fight Nyx?
5691344
So the Metaverse (or collective unconscious) is actually a whole dimension that exists all the time instead of just a temporary realm created by beings like Yaldabaoth and EMMA? Said beings just make it manifest so it can interact with the real world? Thanks, this could help.
5691388
Fight it Yes, that’s What the P3 Cast did in the Final of the Game. Completely Defeat it however is Harder Because Nyx’s Reign over Death Goes into the Conceptual;there no way to Kill it, just Slow it Down and even then the P3 Crew barely managed to do it just enough so Minato could Sacrifice himself.
Nyx does can,as Happened in Canon,Be sealed Away so there his that. All Sweetie Void needs is Distract/Debilitate it Enough while someone else work on the Seal,or maybe just do it Herself.
5691391
I thought that the Nyx fought at the end of P3 was just an avatar.
5691392
Mmm now that you mention it…yeeeah now I remember.
Ok so,it Definitely would make things Way Harder.I think that to Stand up to Nyx’s True Form Sweetie will need Soul Mode,plus Phantom and Apple Death assisting at Full Power. Maybe Minato could also assist since He should be Freed if they are fighting Nyx.
But the Basics would still be the Same:Buy enough time for A new seal to be made.
5691388
I think the real question is: Can humanity survive without the moon? From what I read, Nyx IS the moon. Her body and psyche separated from each other where the latter lives on Earth while her body orbits the planet and can be seen most nights (except on New Moon nights). If the two were ever to reunite, it would be the end of the world. So I can imagine that Sweetie can fight Nyx's body but that would probably mean using power around Galacta Knight's level and blowing it up.
5691404
There could be several solutions, like replacing Nyx by a real Moon, or find a way to definitively kill Erebus so Nyx won't try to cause the Fall anymore.
5691415
Erebus is the manifestation of humanity's negative emotions. Humanity itself fuels its immortality. In a way, it's like Izanami and Yaldabaoth. As long as humanity's dark desires persist, they will persist. This is quite the conundrum since it paints humanity in this world as a self-destructive species. So the lunar replacement idea might be the most realistic idea in this case.
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5691416
Alright but like,where we send Nyx?because what I understood from P3 is that Nyx is Death itself at a Conceptual Level,so even If we get Rid of Its Body(the Moon) its Spirit is unkillable
Maybe send the Whole Moon afar but even then it Would be a risk Because without Minato as a Seal Nyx will be Free to Go Planet-Busting any Planet with a intelligent Race that is as Emotional negative as Humanity.
5691456
Nyx isn't evil, more neutral than anything. It doesn't matter if her psyche stays on Earth as long as it never unites with her body. The issue is that Erebus will continue to try to unite the body and psyche so it can fulfill its purpose of fulfilling humanity's darkest wish. As long as the majority of humanity holds this wish in their hearts, the beast is truly immortal.
5691458
Yeah don’t worry I did understand than most of Nyx’s impulse was because of the wishes of humans.
So in Summary,the only thing left to do if we manage to separate Nyx’s Body and Psyche is ensure to send any of the two halfs to a place than neither Nyx itself or Eberus will ever manage to retrieve it from,correct?
5691487
That or find a way to create a global-scale mementos (Somehow, I feel like the mementos from P5 and P5R was probably just the scale of Tokyo at least and all of Japan at best since we never see foreigners outside Japan in these games). The persona users would go in and steal the collective distorted desire and probably face some sort of true form Erebus and maybe a cult of nihilists.
On a side note, if Sweetie Void and friends are going to get personas, they would have to be contacted by Philemon, the blue butterfly that is seen throughout the persona series. He seems to be the one responsible for awakening them.
5691505
I mean probably but I’m not sure up to what point they really need one you get me?
Neverless it do would be Curious to se just What Their Personas could even be Like, not to mention they would enter a new level of OP, specially If one of them Gets the Fool Arcana lol
5691515
As long as the situation isn't FUBAR, Sweetie seems to play by the rules of the universe she's in. I can see her playing with the persona stuff. She played by the Pokemon World rules up until Team RR played unfairly.
5691519
It was more because they started to become a real threat, so it wasn't really time to play anymore.
5691515
I just saw this on the wiki:
In other words, Sweetie Void, who is an Avatar of the Void, is naturally the Fool.
This is exactly Sweetie Void, excepted maybe the inexperience part. Well, she still certainly needs to learn a lot.
And what did Sweetie go through?
(Well, I guess that finding yourself displaced into an unknown world counts)
5691882
well dang, that makes a hella lot of sense.
curious tho, another recurrent thing with P3 protagonist is that in the end-game, they Unlock some sort of Ultimate Arcana that Represents the end Of their Journeys and the culmination of all of the Bonds they had made along the way.
Following this Line of thought,(taggin Spoiler justs in case wharever I turns Real)Sweetie should Awaken her Ultimate Arcana just at the very end Against Galeem And Darkrom. It also should end Being the most Powerful Ultimate Arcana if just From the Sheer AMOUNT of ¨Social Links¨ that will end up powering it Up. Something Crazy like ¨The Multiverse Arcana¨ or some Cool shit like that.
also too,if she end Up as a Fool Arcana/Wildcard, that Mean she Will Access her own Version of the Velvet Room with usually Are all themed Around the Nature of the Journey of the Current Wildcard. and Last but not Least, This also Means Sweetie is Getting her Very own Velvet Room Attendant.
that would some up about all the Implications with Sweetie Void getting the Fool Arcana,aside from Obviously her getting even more Power.
5691965
During my sleep, my brain thought of all of this for me. There are still some things that I need to look at, like why and how Sweetie Void would get summoned into the Velvet Room, but beside that, I think that I have the gist of Sweetie's inner journey.
If I understand well, a Persona is an incarnation of the user's inner self, right? They manifest because people constantly wear masks to hide what they are deep down. Well, what would happen if you pulled off that mask (and I'm not just talking of what the characters have to do in P5 to awaken their Persona)? If you became one with your Persona? After all, a Goddess (especially a third category one) shouldn't hide herself behind a mask.
5692006
Well to become one with your own persona, sweetie would need first to confront her Shadow self, the Manifestation of Every Dark and Concealed Part of Herself that She Holds deep Down inside her.
Through I Wouldn’t worry much. I think Sweetie would be Mature enough to Accept Her Shadow Self as a part of Her. And if she Gets told before Hand, she could even Meditate in Preparation for it.
5692014
To enter the Velvet Room, there is also that matter about a contract. What is that contract?
5692019
Well from what I get, the Contents of the Contract Itself vary from one wildCard to Another again depending on the Nature of their Inner Journeys but there is A prominent Constant: every Contract Mainly Ask for the Wildcard To Hold Complete Responsibility Over their Actions. Don’t Really Know what that Could entail aside from Obviously be careful to not Abuse the Power.
5692020
I see. I read that in P3, the Contract happened with a kid that only the protagonist could see that was secretly Death. Not seen yet about P4 and P5. I just started watching a walkthrough of P5 Royal.
5692021
Yeah don’t worry,every Wildcard get to Firm their own Contract.
5691515
Kirby is also a textbook case of The Fool.